Disclaimer: I don't own any thing other than the storyline at least parts of it.
Sorry it took so long to get this chapter out. Now be nice... please... Enjoy the chapter.
Chapter 16 - Konoha loses again…
Sasuke and Sakura were now running as they had ditched the ANBU 'Root' that were following them. They had slipped outside the village and into the country side. Sakura had dyed her hair and gone to browns for an outfit. They both had ditched their hitaite back at the Uchiha compound. They did leave a note, 'Gone to find Naruto, will be back soon.' They both thought the council were idiots when Tsunade had given over responsibility to the civilian council. The number and quality of guards had dropped to near genin levels, and inept ones at that, they almost were asking for them to run away.
They at first headed towards the Land of Tea, then doubled back towards Wave and headed for the Land of Rice. They figured once they crossed the border they would be safe from Konoha. Sasuke would have left Sakura had it not been for her insistence that he take her, otherwise she would tell people where he was going. They had also injured some of the guards on their escape and didn't care, as they would have survived the injuries that the duo had inflicted.
It took nearly two days for the news of the duo's escape to reach the Hokage. To say she was livid was a very large understatement. She proceeded to berate the civilian council with 'I told you so' for over two hours. Tsunade put Sasuke into the bingo book as a C-ranked nukenin and Sakura as a D-ranked. The council forced her to make the order to capture first and kill only if necessary.
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Naruto was laughing his head off as Sokka continued his haphazard attack on Naruto. Naruto had opted from his civilian outfit to one similar to Aang's, with his favorite color orange, along with brown. Naruto appeared to be more like a monk than he had before. He wore brown pants and with an orange sash over his torso tied at the waist, he also wore an overcoat that would hide his bare chest. He wore his hair as normal but slightly shorter. Naruto chided Sokka about form and about technique. "Are you already forgetting what the Kyoshi warriors taught you?"
Sokka continued his attacks but the attacks became more directed and his form improved. "Not everyone can learn with shadow clones like you can, Naruto-chan." Sokka returned the jab.
Naruto smiled. "Much better my pupil, you are learning. Enough." Naruto called the spar to a halt. "Your form has become sloppy and you need work. Dang, I sound like Iruka sensei. Now Sokka I need to you to your kata or I am going to find you a Kyoshi warrior battle dress and make you wear it during our spars."
Sokka's face went white with this particular threat. "The makeup too?" Sokka asked as Naruto nodded.
"Hey Aang we have two more kata for me to learn. Either that or we can let Sokka cook again." Naruto teased as everyone in the camp looked at the jinchuuriki in fear.
Sokka face fell. "Hey it wasn't that bad. Naruto wasn't sick the rest of the night."
Naruto heard a groan in his mind. "Even Kyuubi didn't like it, Sokka. Now get back to your kata."
Suddenly as Momo dropped a rock on the ground there was a big boom and the ground shook.
Everyone got into a defensive stance. Momo picked up the rock and looked at it again, he figured it was nothing then dropped it, again the ground shook and there was a boom coming from the distance.
Naruto jumped into the trees. "I see a guy doing some earth bending. Wait! He has seen me and is running towards the village, sorry." Naruto called back to the group.
Everyone but Sokka shook their heads at his antics. Sokka on the other hand slapped his palm on his forehead. The group packed up quickly, left Appa and Momo near the edge of the forest while the group headed into town.
"I don't know if it is such a good idea for you two to wear the colors of the air nomads." Sokka pointed out.
Naruto frowned at Sokka. "I like orange, right Hinata-chan?" Hinata just smiled and nodded not wanting to be dragged into this argument.
"I will not abandon my people to hide from the fire nation." Aang also protested.
"Ix-nay on the ire-fay ation-nay." Sokka grumbled only loud enough for the group to hear as they began to enter the town. Sokka found a flyer posted on the wall of a store. "All earth benders are to be arrested on sight.
A kid was yelling as some fire nation soldiers dragged him away. "That's him." Naruto exclaimed. "Let's follow and find out where they are taking them. Maybe we can free them!"
Sokka shook his head. "This is not our fight."
A woman who was distraught came up to Sokka. "Please help my son! He was accused of earth bending and they are taking him away!" Her eyes pleaded with him. "Okay…" Sokka replied under his breath, as the others laughed gently.
"Anybody have any ideas how we can find out where they are taking them?" Hinata asked.
"I have an idea."
The group found themselves on the mountain in front of a patrol with Naruto and Aang air bending a boulder to make it look like Katara was earth bending. The patrol arrested her and the group was able to follow them to a platform at sea where the Fire Nation had setup a refinery and were using them for refining coal and metal on the refinery. Katara makes contact with Haru the earth bender whom Naruto had spotted earlier that day and been taken to the prison.
Katara attempted to get to know Haru but he was not so giving of his friendship. His father showed great patience and leadership while dealing with the Fire Nation guards. Katara was able to gleam from the prisoners the information that they could not fight the firebenders without some form of earth. Katara came up with an idea but needed both Aang and Naruto to help her.
Katara met with the others during the night and succeeded in getting Naruto and Hinata into the ranks of the prisoners using transformations. Aang and Sokka did not like the idea but Naruto loved it. Aang did feel more at ease with Naruto and Hinata on the platform with Katara. Naruto and Hinata took to their roles quickly and were able to mingle with other prisoners rather easily. They found most had been beaten down and nearly broken. The conversation with Katara was quick and to the point. They either needed to be broken out or needed inspiration to break out.
The next day Katara made quite an inspiring speech but soon realized that the earthbenders would not follow her as they felt they could not fight on equal terms with the firebenders. Finally the warden had had enough of Katara's meddling and tried to have her arrested. The Warden turned and was hit by a lump of coal sent by Haru.
As the battle began Aang was able to send most of the coal reserves from the holding area onto the platform level. The earthbenders took this a sign to defend Haru from the attack from the Warden and a few of his guards. What ensued was total chaos which leant to the favor of the earthbenders and Aang's group. The firebenders were quickly defeated and the earthbenders took the ships back to the mainland and retook their village. Haru and his village were very grateful to Aang, Naruto, Hinata, Sokka, and especially Katara, for giving them back hope.
Naruto smiled and wrapped his arm around Katara as Hinata smiled at him. "So Katara how does it feel to be a hero?" Naruto asked as he hugged Katara and then moved back to Hinata's side.
Katara blushed. "What did I do to become a hero?"
"You stood up to an oppressive tyrant and won." Hinata explained.
"I don't understand, we would have won if it was just us fighting the Fire nation troops by ourselves." Katara countered.
Naruto nodded. "Yes that maybe true, but you were the one to inspire them to make their true freedom possible. Thanks to you they believed they could win. Without that the village would not have been freed and the prisoners would have just returned to their prison in worse condition." Naruto explained.
"Anybody tell you that you are quite smart, Naruto?" Sokka asked.
Naruto shook his head. "Nope, they kept on calling me an idiot. Well… almost everyone." Naruto smiled at Hinata as he made the last comment.
"You have your moments Naruto-kun, you have your moments on both sides." Hinata admitted.
The group then headed to the where they saw a large quantity of fighting. "Want to have some fun?" Naruto asked.
Hinata shook her head as she knew they were going to get into a bunch of trouble with what her husband was going to propose. "What are you up to, Naruto-kun?"
Naruto wore a look of innocence. "What do you mean my love?"
Katara began to shake her head as she saw a smile cross Aang's face. "We are going to get injured aren't we?" Katara whispered to Hinata.
Appa dives behind a bluff and the group dismount. "We will use this as our base of operations. I figure if we hit the Fire Nation army from the side here we could disrupt them." Naruto said as he looked at the battle between an army of firebenders and earthbenders.
Sokka looked like he was thinking then spoke up. "We are too small a group to take on several thousand troops at once but your idea of disrupting their supply chain is brilliant." Sokka raised his hand to forestall any complaints from Naruto. "You might be able to injure quite a few troops but you would be wasting chakra on them when you can let the Earth Kingdom troops work for you. We are a small group, and yes I know you can make a couple thousand clones Naruto, but that will not be enough if they turn on us. Aang is too valuable to be put on the front lines just yet. If we hit them there…" Sokka pointed to a caravan miles behind the main forces fighting. "We can hurt them more. As the main fighting is going to be intense we should focus on hitting them where it hurts, the supply train."
Aang wore a look of dejection upon his face. "You don't think I am ready for combat yet Sokka?"
Sokka shook his head. "Nope, sorry Aang old buddy. You are ready for small engagements where you can extract yourself if we start to get overwhelmed. You maybe an expert airbender but you are still learning to waterbend so we need you to learn how to do it right. Yes… yes, Katara you are a good teacher but Aang needs a master."
Katara nodded agreement. "I hate to admit it but he is right Aang. We are not ready to fight more than a hundred or so at the most. We can do more for the Earth Kingdom if we hit the back lines."
Naruto finally spoke up. "Sorry, Sokka you are right while I can create an army of clones I need to use my ninja skills and strike from the shadows and not create a huge ruckus around where I am fighting. Now let's go and hit the back lines."
The group reloaded onto Appa and moved east to the supply wagons. The group ambushed the train while it was packing up and getting ready to move. An hour later the train was burning and the whole group sported injuries. Naruto had lost his coat to being caught in between several firebenders all bending in a pattern that caught him several times. Hinata had gotten tired and took some shrapnel from an exploding cart she did not get far away enough before the explosive tag blew up. Katara had some mild burns as she was running intercept for Aang and Sokka who were along with Naruto bringing the guards out and away from the carts. Naruto had left some clones to hide their eventual escape.
"Hey Sokka, I am glad you talked me out of hitting the flank of the army. We are definitely not ready for a standing fight. We have thus far only ambushed and not had too many standup fights like this. I know I learned a lot about how to and how not to fight Fire Nation soldiers." Naruto commented.
"Sokka also has his moments." Katara teased Sokka who just wiped the grime from his face as they flew away from the battle area. A couple hours later they landed near a waterfall and proceeded to wash themselves in the cold water as it was still a few weeks until the winter solstice and the water was quite cold.
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"So you have finally come, Sasuke-kun? And who is your companion?" Orochimaru asked.
Sasuke looked at the bandaged man with disdain. "I am here to learn, now train me."
Kabuto leaned into Sasuke so that Sakura and Sasuke could both hear him. "That is Orochimaru-sama and I wouldn't try to aggravate him." Kabuto warned.
Sakura bowed. "I am Haruno Sakura, Orochimaru-sama."
"Ah, so the little bird has some courage and can speak. It is a pleasure to meet you Sakura-chan." Orochimaru replied as his tongue came out of his mouth and licked his lips, Sakura was inwardly disgusted by this display. "You will become Kabuto's apprentice. Now both of you leave and we will begin your training tomorrow."
Sakura bowed, then followed an annoyed Sasuke and a weary Kabuto.
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The gang flew over a blackened patch of forest and landed. They landed to inspect the damage. Aang seem depressed as he saw the devastation, the ground was ash and the trees were burnt to a crisp. Sokka noticed tracks on the ground. "Fire Nation! I am beginning to hate those guys, what are they doing destroying a forest?" Sokka yelled as Katara and Hinata both shushed him. "What?"
Both Hinata and Katara pointed at Aang who collapsed to his knees and began to sift through the remaining ash. "I don't get it. I just wish…"
"What do you wish Aang-kun?" Hinata asked as she knelt beside Aang.
Naruto dug something up and tossed it to Katara with a grin on his face. She caught the item and understood when she looked at it.
"I just don't understand how anyone could do this and how could I let this happen?" Aang's words rang with self-doubt.
"Aang-kun, you didn't let this happen, it has nothing to do with you." Hinata attempted to reassure Aang.
"Yes it does, I am the Avatar and it is my job to protect nature. I just wish I had a teacher to help me with this." Aang replied.
"That is why we are headed to the North Pole to get you a teacher." Katara stated.
Aang turned to Katara. "That is for waterbending, I need one for being the Avatar. Monk Giatzo told me that Avatar Roku would be my guide but I haven't been able to figure out how to contact him. I just wish there was a way to contact him." Aang complained as something suddenly hit him in the head and then dropped into his hand. "What was that for?"
Katara smiled at Aang. "Look at it." Aang noticed it was an acorn. "It's an acorn, those are all over the place and eventually they will grow into mighty oak trees."
Naruto chuckled. "If I had the Mokuton ability I could speed the process up." Naruto stated as Hinata nodded agreement.
Aang nodded as he understood that Naruto wanted to help. The group noticed a presence a moment before he spoke. "You must be the Avatar. Can you help our village? People have been coming up missing as a spirit keeps on attacking each evening." The man questioned.
Aang nodded as the group followed the man to a battered village. They heard a story of a spirit running rampage over the village to take a single person each night. As evening approached Naruto and Aang both thought they could figure out this with the help of Kyuubi or possibly Aang's Avatar powers.
As the sun set a growth of bamboo covered the entrance to the village, a large six limbed black and white creature appeared from the bamboo forest. Naruto immediately ran towards the creature with Kyuubi red chakra evident. "Why are you attacking this village?" Naruto yelled as Aang came up beside Naruto. A powerful white light that emanated from the creature's mouth struck both of them. Both Naruto and Aang were gone and the creature left.
Aang was standing in front of a panda as it walked away, Aang ran after the panda as it entered the bamboo forest and both disappeared. Aang set his glider to fly and landed on his face without being able to fly. Now he noticed he could not bend and he appeared to not be corporeal. "Great now what do I do?" As if to answer his question a dragon flew up from behind him and in a fright Aang ran away from the dragon.
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Naruto noticed a panda walking away from him but also a fox the size of a horse next to him. "Kyuubi?"
The fox nodded. "Yes kit it is me, now we follow the panda to where it leads, we are in spirit form. This could prove troublesome if the seal breaks during our time in the spirit realm. Now we must follow that animal quickly to figure out what is going on." Both ran after the panda and into the bamboo forest.
Naruto began to sniff and noticed his senses were much better than before. "Hey Kyuubi why can I smell the panda now as before my senses were only a little better than normal?"
"In a way we have merged and in a way we have separated. I am more a kitsune right now than the Kyuubi as I can access only one tail and no chakra at all in this realm." The fox replied as they followed the scent of the panda to a clearing where it sat with three frightened humans.
A man pointed at Naruto. "Who or what are you?"
Naruto looked down at the stream that ran through the clearing and saw that his features had changed. He had protruding canines, blue pupils that were slits, his hair was wilder, his ears were replaced by fox ears, and finally his whisker marks were much darker and wider. "I am Uzumaki Naruto, and this is Kyuubi, my companion, we are going to try to get you out of here if we can. Has the animal hurt you in any way?" Naruto asked as they all shook their heads. "Okay has anybody tried to talk to it?" Again they shook their head. Naruto and Kyuubi walked over to the panda, which just sat there and moaned. "Why did you take these people and attack the village?"
The panda growled and roared at Naruto. Naruto looked at Kyuubi. Kyuubi barked and growled back at the panda, this continued back and forth for a good twenty minutes before it stopped.
The Kyuubi turned it head towards Naruto and began to inform him what was going on. "Well kit…" Only to be interrupted by the others.
"The fox, it's talking! And the weird one is consorting with both the beasts." One man screamed.
Naruto just sighed at the outburst. "You know about spirits, right?" Naruto asked with an annoyed voice and the man nodded. "Well the fox and panda are spirit beasts, it is just that the fox can speak both languages, so shut up and let him explain what is going on, jeez!" Naruto ordered as the man nodded his acknowledgement.
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Aang finally after running for a few minutes made it to the area that had been burned down. He stopped in front of a bear statue. The dragon stopped short and touched Aang's forehead with one of its feelers on its face. Multiple images ran through Aang's mind. "You're Roku's animal like Appa is mine." Aang exclaimed as the dragon nodded. Aang mounted the dragon and they flew towards the fire country, specifically the fire temple that honored the fire Avatars.
The dragon took Aang into the fire temple. He saw the calendar dial on the floor that showed the solstice. "I need to be here for the solstice?" Aang asked as the dragon nodded. Aang mounted the dragon again and they flew back towards the village and the statue. Aang watched as they headed directly into the statue with his body sitting on top of it. Aang screamed as they hit the statue.
He woke and figured out what he needed to do as he ran back towards the village.
The monster was waiting at the gates for him. "Haibi, you do not need to worry about the forest as it will grow back." Aang explained as he handed an acorn to Haibi. Haibi nodded and took the acorn and turned to the gates as a bamboo forest appeared Naruto, a fox and several others left the forest. The fox was pulled into Naruto as he left the forest and he collapsed a few feet from it. Hinata ran to Naruto and began to examine him.
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"Well, Sasuke ran like we thought he would, the guards will recover, thank goodness. Now…" Tsunade was explaining to Jiraiya as a toad with what appeared to be a scroll in his body appeared.
"Jiraiya… the seal is losing containment…" The toad explained as the paper of the scroll unfurled. The seal glowed bright red and released a great deal of chakra as a vortex opened in the Hokage's office and the chakra left into the vortex. The floor between the toad and the vortex was charred.
Jiraiya was heard yelling "Oh shit! This is not good."
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Hinata felt a huge chakra presence as she looked up a vortex appeared above her and Naruto. Not knowing what was going on she jumped onto Naruto and covered him with her own body. 'I will protect you my love.' Hinata thought to herself. A mass of chakra hit her in the back and passed through her into Naruto, both started to writhe in pain. Naruto was encompassed in the red chakra aura as was Hinata. Both screamed in pain as they saw Naruto transform into his Kyuubi form, red eyes with slits for pupils, elongated canines, widened whisker marks and his hair became very wild. They could tell that Hinata was also affected by the chakra, but not how.
Aang's tattoos turned white as Haibi changed from a panda back to its monstrous form and both put an energy barrier around Naruto and Hinata. As the chakra hit a peak it then passed back through Hinata and bounced off the barrier into a form. It slowly took the shape of a girl with two tails and flowing red hair. She was facing Naruto and Hinata, the girl opened her eyes, and they were blood red with slits for pupils, she reached out and touched Naruto's face and smiled. "Naruto-kun..." She whispered only loud enough for Aang to hear as he and Haibi both dropped the barrier as her body formed. Haibi returned to panda from roared softly and then went back to the bamboo forest.
"Oh, my…" Sokka said as he looked at the scene. Before him were three naked people, Naruto with Hinata covering him and a girl with red hair curled up next to the two. Sokka immediately grabbed a couple blankets and covered the threesome. "What happened, Aang?" Sokka asked as he turned to see Katara holding Aang up as he appeared to be ready to collapse.
Katara gently set Aang down and then moved to the three under the blanket. "Sokka get some clothes for them." Katara ordered as Sokka ran to Appa and grabbed some clothes from the packs. Katara's hands turned green with chakra as she examined all three through the blanket. "Hinata is currently trying to absorb chakra that seems to be putting a strain on her chakra system, without her help I can't tell any more. The girl is not quite human but has a human physiology. She is suffering from chakra exhaustion. Naruto is suffering from a similar malady as Hinata. Sokka I will need your help getting them dressed, you will not mention that you have seen any of them naked to anyone."
Sokka nodded and knelt down next to his sister. "You don't have to tell me twice as Naruto would kill me if I told him that I had seen his wife naked, same goes for Hinata and you." Sokka gulped as he observed Katara also swallowing hard.
Katara lifted the blanket and moved to the side of Naruto and Hinata. "Okay Sokka catch her and then we will begin to dress them both, then we can deal with the new girl." Sokka nodded as Katara gently pushed Hinata into Sokka's waiting hands. She was lain on her back and the first thing that either of them noticed was the burn mark on Hinata's stomach, they then looked at Naruto and saw the same mark but reversed on his stomach. "The seal was broken." Katara said with a gasp. She then examined the bodies quickly as she suppressed a blush as seeing Naruto in the buff. "Okay Sokka stop gawking at Hinata, yes she is quite developed for a girl of her age but she is married, now let's get them dressed. I will take Hinata and you take Naruto here, that way we can keep our minds on the job at hand." Sokka broke his gaze from Hinata and nodded as he and Katara switched places. They both began to dress their friends.
After that was done Aang moved over to the trio and they all looked at the girl. "Who is she?" Sokka asked.
"My guess is that she is the Kyuubi, there is no other explanation for it." Aang answered. "We should get her dressed. I would say also that we should cut some holes so that we do not hurt her tails."
"But I thought the Kyuubi was a guy, I mean male." Sokka quipped.
"Naruto and Hinata both commented that kitsune or foxes are known for their cunning and for their deception. So it may have been trying to protect itself by making us think it was male." Aang answered as they pulled the blanket off the girl and began to dress her. They made sure to make the clothing fit as good as possible. They also noticed that her ears were fox like and were on the top of her head and not the sides like everyone else. They then placed all three unconscious people into Appa's saddle. Both Hinata and the girl seemed to snuggle up to Naruto as the others put the blankets on them. "We need to go to the fire nation so that I can meet Roku." Aang explained.
"Avatar Aang, thank you for returning our missing people, we will be eternally grateful to you." The head of the village yelled up to the saddle.
"You are welcome and work on tending the forest that had been burned down Haibi will help you if he can and not cause you any more problems." Aang yelled back as Appa rose into the air. Aang directed Appa towards the Fire Nation, specifically the fire temple.
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A/N: What is going on? I am not going to tell anyone other than my betas… As for this being a slight deviation from cannon well that had to happen, I needed for Aang to understand about the spirit realm and also have him figure out what would fix it. As for the seal thing... not going to tell. I hope you liked the chapter anyways. I know I put two episodes into one chapter but it was fun that way and I changed a few things from the original.